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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24276997">Survive</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joyeu/pseuds/Joyeu'>Joyeu</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>M/M, Shingeki no Kyojin: Kuinaki Sentaku | Attack on Titan: No Regrets Spoilers, Titan Shifter Eren Yeager</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-05-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-05-19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-03 00:47:19</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>613</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24276997</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joyeu/pseuds/Joyeu</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Nothing prepared Levi for the moment they found the last survivor outside the walls. Nothing prepared him for the way that Eren Jaeger drew him in, demanded his trust, and made him recklessly hope. Hope so hard, like he wanted to dive headfirst into a future instead of walking to a predestination. It should have warned him, the devotion that slowly crept up on him like a thief in the night when he first saw Eren's Titan form. </p><p>But it wasn’t until the moment Eren betrayed them all, that Levi fully understood what Kenny had told him so long ago:<br/>“Never trust a survivor until you know what they’ve done to survive.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Levi/Eren Yeager</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>7</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>34</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Survive</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Hi, this is my first fic!</p><p>This will mainly explore the relationship between Levi and Eren, but it will also follow the plot of the original loosely. One day the Survey Corp finds Eren, a survivor living outside the walls and takes him in. This first chapter is kind of background on Levi, and a prologue of sorts. </p><p>What's Eren's past? How will he adjust to life inside the walls? What about Armin and Mikasa and all his friends,? How will Eren's Titan shifter powers work? And how much more differently does Titan behavior work here? What's the connection between Levi and Eren, and how will it develop in the future?</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Never trust a survivor until you know what they’ve done to survive.”<br/>
This was the first lesson Kenny taught him after his mother died. </p><p>When Levi was 9 years old, Kenny found him collapsed in a dark alleyway. Awake, but barely conscious, he was sprawled on the ground, motionless. The man had then leisurely approached him, and said his famous words.</p><p>Levi realized then, that the world wasn’t kind. That helping a crippled street rat by giving him your food meant getting knocked unconscious the moment you turned your back. That your gang of allies would easily betray you and beat you to take your place. That sweet mothers who gave their son the world were taken from it incredibly easily. And mentors who taught you and took you in, would just as soon watch you take a beating to teach you a life lesson.</p><p>Those early years with Kenny were the years his mother’s death were still dawning on him. And the gaping hole her kindness had left behind tried to fill itself through useless acts of service. Trying to feed the hungry when he was barely alive himself. Trying to band together all the homeless to etch out a living in this hell. Who was he kidding? The world was shitty and people were shittier. He couldn't even blame the people who betrayed him, because it would've done nothing. The only thing he could do was clean up as much shit in this hellhole as possible and enjoy it all before he caved in to death.  </p><p>So when Kenny flicked a knife onto the ground beside Levi, he took a long look at his reflection in the blade. And he never let it go again. </p><p>Since then Levi had been cold and methodical. Systematic in efficiency and brutal in his movements. He channeled his disgust for dirt into beating the filthy beings that lived in the underground, and the clean sweep of his blade was his tool for mercy. Better at a knife than anyone he’s ever met, Levi had bled tears, beaten thugs, and gotten into so many knife fights in his youth that the scar tissue still criss crossed his body like spider web. </p><p>Isabel and Farlan had been his one moment of kindness, but they had both died, so he had moved on. Many of his Survey comrades since have died in their bloody, fruitless expeditions, kind people who had reached their hand out to him, but still, he moved on. The world wasn’t easy to people who gave their heart away, and though he didn’t regret the time he had spent with good people, he had known where this would all lead, so he did what he had to, closed his heart, remembered them, and moved on. </p><p>But nothing prepared Levi for the moment they found the last survivor outside the walls. Nothing could ever have prepared him for the way that Eren Jaeger drew him in, demanded his trust, and made him recklessly hope. Hope so hard, like he wanted to dive headfirst into a future instead of walking to a predestination.</p><p>Eren was the end of all beginnings, and the beginning of his end. Levi had known from the start that nothing would ever bring him faster to weakness. Still, he couldn’t care less. And it should have warned him, the devotion that slowly crept up on him like a thief in the night when he first saw Eren's Titan form. </p><p>But it wasn’t until the moment Eren betrayed them all, that Levi fully understood what Kenny had told him so long ago:</p><p>“Never trust a survivor until you know what they’ve done to survive.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>As this is my first fic, I have a story that I've always wanted to tell, but you can help me find the right way to tell it. Whether its a "this sucks" in the comments or "I liked that part" or "I think this will happen next..." or "why do you have so many unnecessary commas", I value all of it obsessively.</p><p>Nothing will stop me from writing this trainwreck for my babies, but I value any kind of sharing or advice to make it better. I may rewrite this chapter later also. Anything for a fun story.</p></blockquote></div></div>
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